Real Madrid presidential candidate Enrique Riquelme has placed Rodri at the centre of his summer pledges, intensifying speculation about the Manchester City midfielder ahead of the June 7 election. Hitting the campaign trail, Riquelme told Tiempo de Juego: \u201cRodri is a great player, I\u2019ve said it countless times these past few days when I\u2019ve been asked, and I have no reason to hide it; if I were president of Real Madrid , a player like Rodri… well , he would play for Real Madrid.<\/p>\n
\u201cThen we wouldn\u2019t have to go through the painful embarrassment of not having any Real Madrid players on the Spanish national team. I would like Rodri to play for Real Madrid.\u201d<\/p>\n
Florentino P\u00e9rez, the incumbent, has not commented specifically on the prospect of signing Rodri. The club is widely expected to strengthen its midfield this summer after the departures of Toni Kroos and Luka Modri\u0107. P\u00e9rez has also presented a high-profile campaign poster listing his past signings, leaving a space that reads \u201cto be continued.\u201d<\/p>\n
Rodri himself has not closed the door on a move. Speaking during a media day as the national team prepares for the World Cup, the 2024 Ballon d\u2019Or winner said he will assess his club future after the tournament. \u201cIt\u2019s part of football,\u201d he told reporters when asked about the Real Madrid links.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m focused on being a leader for the national team. That\u2019s my path. I understand the noise, but I\u2019m not going to dedicate my time to that. We\u2019ll see after the World Cup.\u201d<\/p>\n
Those remarks leave Madrid with a clear opening. There will be particular urgency at the club to find an elite midfield controller after recent exits, and Rodri\u2019s profile has repeatedly been linked to the Bernab\u00e9u. The absence of any Real Madrid players in Spain\u2019s World Cup squad for the first time has added to the debate about the club\u2019s midfield needs.<\/p>\n
Rodri\u2019s previous comments keep the connection alive. Back in 2024 he told Cadena SER: \u201cWhen Real Madrid call you, the best club in history, the most successful, everything that means… Obviously, it\u2019s an honour and you always have to pay attention, of course.\u201d With Riquelme, a 37-year-old considered the underdog against P\u00e9rez, publicly campaigning for a signing of Rodri\u2019s type, Madrid\u2019s decision makers will have to weigh the option this summer regardless of the election outcome.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Rodri has not ruled out leaving Manchester City, amid Real Madrid election talk before June 7 vote.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":14157,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[238,987],"tags":[1064],"class_list":["post-14158","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-manchester-city","category-real-madrid","tag-ballon-dor-2"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14158","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14158"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14158\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14157"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14158"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14158"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14158"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}